Don't like it? Get over it.

2016-0312 Saturday

By JACQUES NECHQUES. Recommended number of wine glasses before reading this piece:

E'LL AWAKE tomorrow morning, having lost an hour of night to the Daylight Saving Time thief.

It’s a favorite topic of conversation: to lament the extremely strenuous and stressful responsibility we have, to twice-yearly change our clocks. It’s just such hard work.

And who in their right mind would want to make those glorious summer evenings longer, when it would be so much easier to simply leave the clocks alone and spend that summer daylight as The Lord Himself intended: Luxuriously lounging in our comfy, bourgeoisie beds every morning, unconscious and totally unaware of the glorious daylight through which we’re snoozing.

Who in their right mind?

Well, I consider myself to be in my right mind, and to those who love to complain about DST, I have two words: Get over it.

I absolutely love Daylight Saving Time; I also actually love the traditional, almost liturgical, process of springing forward and falling back every six months or so. I really do. It’s like a rite of spring, in the spring, to say goodbye to the dark days of winter. Springing Forward is a way for us commoners to unite and raise our collective voices, saying, “I won’t slip quietly into the night! I will move forward into the light!” It’s a way of heralding the arrival of longer, brighter days.

In the autumn, Falling Back is a way of recognizing that the bleak midwinter is a-coming, and we would be wise to prepare. Plus, in the fall, we get that hour back—as well as all of its luxurious side-effects and implications of horizontal wonderfulness. [Those what complain of losing the hour in the spring are reticent to remember that we DO get it back! It’s not like it’s gone forever!]

PREVENTING DEATH AND OTHER THINGS

It’d be interesting to do a study (only, of course, if said study backed up my hypothesis) to find out how many precious lives are saved every year because of DST. No, I’m not talking about the differences between more light in the early-day vs. more light in the late-day; I’m talking about the tradition of checking the smoke-detector (and for that matter, the radon detector, carbon monoxide detector, radar detector and the remote control) batteries when one resets one’s clocks. How many fires/deaths and other bad things are prevented by this tradition? Without the semi-annual chore of fiddling with the clocks, when would we be reminded to change the batts? If we end DST, the blood of those saved lives is on your hands, my friend.

THE RESULTS OF OUR EXCLUSIVE POLL

Not wanting to ignore our fan base, The RASH, of Gresham commissioned an exlusive poll (as we are wont to do from time-to-time) to poke our proverbial wet finger into the air and test the winds, as it were, of public opinion regarding DST. Our results were astounding. Astounding, that is, if one was previously inclined to believe the liberal media. Said media would have all of us believe that people hate DST.

That's not what we found.

As even a most cursory examination of the delicious pie chart to the right will elucidate, over 63 per cent of our respondents actually LOVE Daylight Saving Time. And of those who love DST, over 40 per cent of them love it so much they'd like to see Hillary issue an executive order mandating year-round observance of DST, once she takes office. Only about 36 per cent of our respondents think DST should be abolished. (And it is to those some-36 per cent this article is addressed, BTW.)

CLOCKS SET THEMSELVES ANYWAY

It’s the 21st century, right? And although the oft’ promised flying cars of our day do not exist, we do enjoy the increasingly common presence of self-setting clocks, thanks to that Universal Time Beacon thingy what sends discrete signals to our devices, telling them when to skip a beat, so to speak. Example: One never has to change the time on one’s cell phone if said phone is tuned in to this network, right? And your DVR? Sets itself too. Sure, there aren’t enough auto-set clocks in the world yet, but they are coming.

WHINERS GON’ WHINE

The above serious considerations notwithstanding, there are way too many of you out there who insist on ignoring the benefits of DST; you love to complain about the negatives of DST (and possibly everything). Again, my thesis is that there are no negatives. Yet people being people (as some are) a few just won’t listen, no matter how brilliant my argument. I could continue to tout benefit after benefit of DST and some wouldn’t care.

I get that. It’s okay. I realize my powers of persuasion are limited. Not everyone who hears my voice, or reads my words, will be elucidated to the point of my wonderful understanding. I’ve had to come to grips with the fact that not everyone shares my elucidation. (In fact, that fact just makes me more stalwart and committed to elucidating the masses. As long as there are ignernt people out there, I have a purpose.)

So, you just go ahead and whine about it. I have it on good authority that Hillary will make sure that DST endures. She's wonderful.

Now, you'll excuse me please. I need to get to bed early. Gon' lose an hour, you know....